Sam Silverman: RETIRED at 28 Years Old using Passive Real Estate Investing Strategies

In this episode of "The Gould Mine," Sam Silverman, a skilled real estate investor running a fund of funds model, recounts his successful journey, including raising $70 million for private placement syndications and funds. Transitioning from tech sales to real estate, Sam leveraged his sales expertise and relentless work ethic to excel in LP investing. He emphasizes the importance of relationship building and self-accountability in achieving early success.

Sam shares valuable insights on his growth strategies, such as using his corporate job for stability, understanding sales dynamics, and prioritizing long-term financial independence over immediate profits. He discusses effective ways to connect with investors, including through social media platforms like LinkedIn, and the shift towards investing in funds for better returns and diversification.

The episode also touches on the nuances of investing in short-term rentals like Airbnb and the significance of pricing and revenue management in real estate. Sam highlights the importance of protective measures like long-term fixed-rate debt to safeguard against market downturns. His story is a testament to the power of combining technical skills, strategic investment, and personal development in building a successful real estate career.

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Transcript

• •  What's up gold miners. Man have we got an episode for you. Today. I have the privilege of interviewing Sam Silverman who is quickly made a name for himself. In the real estate space. Sam has raised over $70 million in private Capital to place in real estate syndications and funds and he has invested himself into over 60 deals as a limited partner. Not only that Sam has an impressive resume. He is also a founding member of tech Vester which has established itself as a highly reputable real estate fund focusing primarily on short-term rentals and Airbnb oh and did I mention uh yeah. He's 29 years old. This guy is super impressive and in this episode we cover a wide array of topics starting from how Sam built his financial foundation and set himself up to never have to work again. By the age of 28. We then pivot into a conversation around short-term rentals. The trends that Sam is seeing in the short-term rental space right now and what tech festor has done from an investment strategy standpoint to protect itself from falling victim to things like air B&B fatigue or the various metros that have decided to impose sanctions on short-term rentals and finally Sam shares some phenomenal advice for anyone who's just getting started in the real estate investing Journey whether you are a passive investor or even if you're looking to take on a more active role. Sam has some really great advice for you. This one is an absolute gem everyone so let's welcome to the show. Sam Silverman Sam welcome to the gold mine cool man thanks for thanks for having me on yeah so been seeing you on online now for a long time clearly establish yourself as a thought leader uh in the specifically in you know the commercial real estate space. The capital raising space someone just tuned into this podcast. They've never heard of Sam Silberman before why should they pay attention to this episode. So on my end. There's you know few businesses that I run that I think are impactful looking at the real estate space and just Capital raising in general so on my end. Over the last you know two and a half or so years. I've raised close $70 million of retail investor capital for private placement syndications and funds so all working on the investor side of the house. Gotten very very niche in that area so by trait not an operator much more so on the capital side of the house um and I've gotten very very very deep versus wide house okay well. Why don't we why don't. We start there because you weren't always doing this right and so can you recall like that aha moment where you just decided hey. I'm I'm GNA do this like what was that uh switch flipped inside of you yeah. So I started prior to being in real estate in the sales World in Tech. So I worked on the outbound sales side where I was going out hunting for new logos right inside sales. We spend a lot of time on buyer profiling. So Qui can work my way up end up building a team in new company from zero to 120 employees. Um over you know about a two-year period and that teams their sole job was here's the list of our current customers. Go find accounts look similar and go find Executives. Those accounts look similar to buyers who bought most in the past so I'll tie that back in a second but from there sort of buying single family houses built. A portfolio of nine 10 houses realized I absolutely hated doing it and for me being in sales. It's a field in which you can make three four 5x. What your package says you should make. It's also a field in which you can get fired for performance the next quarter and make far less you should if you don't perform so for me. When looking the single family side of it. It wasn't worthwhile enough to not put more effort in my day job. So from there sold a portfolio off got into LP investing I think I invested into like 20 deals over about a nine 10 month period and then realize quickly that two things actually matter right to get Equity into a deal. One you find a deal for me. I wasn't going to do that right like didn't fit to my skill set didn't fit to my time bandwidth. Second you find money that fit very well when looking at the skills that I had in terms of investor profiling hunting for New Leads so basically taking all that Tech and sales knowledge and applying it to building out investor list and leveraging those connections I had for investing as NP with a top operators to go build a business entirely around that so people who are listening to this podcast right now and not watching it on YouTube are probably like yeah that sounds awesome but anyone who is watching this right now is looking at you. They're sizing you up and they're being like this guy's like 18 years old. Like you know you look super young if and by the way like I I I get that all the time too. It's like how have you how have you managed to do so much in so little time like buying 10 single family. Homes is no small feat then liquidating that putting it into like 20 different uh 20 different Pro uh syndications funds whatever how did you find success at such an early age and and what can you attribute that success to Sam because it's it's pretty impressive man. So I think people when they first get into like their careers. They start looking all these side Ventures. It's really easy to get distracted like for me. I knew I need to work for myself from the day I started working. I built businesses when I was super young like even before College as well and I knew that at some point I'd work myself so in that period of time. The only thing I cared about was making money because I knew this was not what I wanted to go do but in the interim. The more money I made the more optionality I had to go bigger quicker when I figured out what I was actually want to do for myself. So those set s years I was in Corporate America. I was working 80 100 hours a week. Most people don't want to make those kind of sacrifices to go get to a place. They want to go to so for me like I was in isolation in my office. Monday through Sunday every week from you know 6:00 to 10. 6 amm to 10 p.m. every night besides the gym and lunch and do you know doing a few things here and there like that was it. That was all I did because I was in roles in which they'd pay you.
  •  The more you performed and in sale especially entry LEL sales and kind of starting out. It's a volume game right in sales. It's a equation what's your output times. What's your conversion and until your conversion is really good. You can outwork it and for me. That's what I did so in turn. I was that kid picked out of the mail room right and when looking at you know I was a top person in my company of 50 plus people. In my role. Every single month I was there right and then in turn I got hired to a you know executive role at 23 years old in a public company to go build out 100 person plus team and for me it was finding someone in leadership who would go bet on you because the way I think about it is that say you're a six out of 10 in something right. If you keep doing that same thing you're likely to stay a six out of 10. But if you force yourself in scenarios that requires to be an eight out of 10 and you can accomplish that you're now you're now an eight out of 10. So in turn I worked my ass off to go find people who would take a chance on me to give me the opportunity of putting myself in positions that required me to go level up and turn make far more money in doing so. So a lot of it was one busting your ass to do really well two building relationships and with people that will go bet on you uh in in senior type roles and what that looks like was I think a big thing people. Miss really frequently is what's your ratio of what do you do versus. What do you say. The better that ratio is in terms of completing the you say you're GNA go do makes it a lot better for people to go trust you with those things. If you're a senior leader at a company and you have people under you like think large teams. The biggest thing you can go have in your corner is when someone says I got this they actually go do it if the and you have people who say that and they don't do it that then lingers on your plate mentally until they actually get that done so for you as a you know employee or a leader in a bigger company if you say you're going to do something go do it right and if you can hold yourself accountable to that your. Leader knows that you'll get opportunity and opportunity opportunity to go follow that because you make their life easier so to kind of close the loop here as well. When I was still had my last day job which was a VPS sales at a company called perimetric right running a multiple region. Division I built my entire investor base and investor list in doing so I working two full-time jobs. So for me I saw a light in the tunnel where I can go sacrifice a period of years of my life to go be fully fin. Independent just turned 208 years old. Right I would never have to work again in my entire life. Like I I could stop today. I'll be exactly how I live right now and not do a single thing ever again. I would go nuts in doing so right like I need to go do things. But yeah I was okay making that period of sacrifice to go be in a position where I'm now entirely set for whatever I want to do going forward. Would you say that because you've always had entrepreneurial Tendencies right so it could have been very easy for you at say age 18 20 2122 for you to go out there and and start your own thing. But you took some years there in the middle between uh you know the time that you graduated high school. You you went to you went to school presumably. I did yeah yeah so I was 21 leaving College like my first entry like Tech sales role yeah okay so you went to college came out instead of going back down that entrepreneurial path. You you opted to go with the you know with the corporate path knowing that one day you you'd return back. Do you think that like doing like if you had to reflect back on it and everything you use that corporate job to essentially create enough cash flow and enough enough of uh Financial foundation so that you never have to work again in your life like if you had done it. The opposite way do you think that you'd be further ahead right now at the same place or behind right because like definitely not the same place so either way ahead or way behind yeah right. There's no there's no middle ground that so I have tons of friends who have gone the let me go build a small Tech startup type thing that's really Boomer bust right so for me. The likelihood of achieving goals was always needed. Right I didn't come from a family who had money to go support you right. It was if you go strike out that's it. There's no fall back in terms of having a safety net so for me taking the corporate route. I actually helped me a ton in what I'm doing today right. The skills you learn of leading teams managing people understanding how to go sell if you can understand how to go sell and understand the psychology of how people buy and how they think and operate. You can do whatever you want to go do any company. You go St if you're not your best salesperson at first like we've all watched Shark Tank think of someone going on there like have you sold anything yet and the answer is no there's no shot they getting a deal that the person buying their entire company so your end you need to get it from zero to one right understanding how to go sell so for me. That was always my background. My competency I was running sales teams at 14 15 years old for event Planning Companies that I built and I knew I can go sell so until I figured out what I actually wanted to go do. I'm like let make as much money as possible live below. My means Park capital in places that actually make money and go take those bets and they panned out mostly really well so yeah. I think to answer your question either very far ahead or at zero. And I think if I was at zero knowing what I I did at know 21. I probably could make it back now. I'm in a place where going to zero doesn't scare me at all right because those skills that you've learned along the way of doing yourself. You can't have those taken from you yep 100% that is 100% true and it's interesting because you know right. Now I I feel like we're in that uh T like that time period right now where the the the information is so readily available out there and and it seems like you know everyone and their mother wants to be an entrepreneur and uh. But it's it's kind of refreshing to see you know your journey. You obviously had entrepreneurial Tendencies from a from a young age. But you're you you you built that Foundation before you really like jumped into uh this next chapter of your life. And I think it's brilliant dude like I think it's I think it's really smart and you know I look I look at um. I look at a lot of people that didn't do that you know that just went straight into their entrepreneurial journey. And it's more often than not they're they're exactly as you said they're like. They're still at zero very very close to it and and of course like there's Lessons Learned along the way. But it's it's very interesting to kind of have this conversation with you because I think it's. It's a road that probably more should people should explore and and um yeah. I think it's awesome yeah and it's something too that I give you an example at had a buddy in college came from a lot of family money and he was started day trading right and leverag part of family portfolio. And he had some incredible runs but for him. A focus was how can I have a big run and take massive swings where if I hit I'm good and in turn when that H when you take swings like that likely a lot of Leverage when look at the stock market as well and you miss you're at zero so for me by investing I start investing at 23 maybe what 22 23 and I knew that if if you look at like a a compound calculator if I just don't mess up entirely if I don't have strikeouts. If I don't double plays like walks and singles I'll be set like beyond beyond set long term. So for me I was more concerned with the likelihood of success than maximizing every single dollar possible because for me like when leaving my day job right like I hung on to my day job probably more than single wood in my position. You're left my I left my job I raised $40 million of private Capital right and that's with a mid to high six figure VP LEL role at a 3,000 person company on top of that. So I hung on longer than most would because I knew once I left I could never go back to it. So for me the likelihood of success and kind of that Freedom piece of it mattered more than making a few extra bucks in certain scenarios and going for bigger risk profiles. It's incredible man and I think that any young person who's listening to this episode right now who should be taking notes because this is a very fresh perspective that I think people should be paying attention to let's. Let's flip gears a little bit Sam because you keep saying at $70 million in capital rais private. Capital you raised 40 m million of that when you were um working another job. What strategies did you use or have you used in the past or are you know currently using to raise that kind of capital and when on top of that what is it that you do that keeps investors coming back so when looking at kind of how I built out my entire investor list from scratch. It was all things that I learned in the sales world. Right one is understand who the niche of investor you want to have for me. It was people who were in high-end selling roles in techer software or senior leadership roles on the sales side in techer software.
  •  So second it's figuring out okay. How do. I like what's my story for these people. How do I have a common connection with them for me. I was in that exact same seat at that exact. Same time. It was a peer-to-peer conversation then so it wasn't coming off as some like investment sales. Guy I was coming off as someone who's like hey I'm in your role. I have zero money in the stock market myself. I'm in 20 plus these projects myself. My own money was there these sponsor us prior like I have a story for them. It's very compelling yep. Third is figuring out how do you get in front of these people at scale I hate conferences. I think conference is the biggest waste of time in the entire world. Right being podcasts like this are great for credibility and sharing your story horrible for attracting investors typically right. Most real estate podcasts you go on are really bad for the person going on there to go attract investors great for credibility but if you want to go be somewhere where you're the only real estate person the only investment sponsor in that area versus being a credibility type play. This is great for credibility right that understanding your Avenue of what you're looking for is really important. There's huge value in both but understanding what that is first matters so for me. My Avenue was LinkedIn sales. Navigator I can go build a list of 100,000 people who fit my M profile and by by their profile I can tell you. This first play makes roughly. This you can sort by company location seniority. What their role is so building out list of people and in turn going in adding them every week. You get 150 connection requests a week so when you think of your LinkedIn Network building an audience around you who actually fits the profile you want to go speak to. It's insanely important because if you look your LinkedIn your Facebook whatever social media you have and you're like okay of these people on here. What percent fit the profile that could be a customer for me in some kind of business that I have if it's low go reeval like what what you're doing there. So if me a LinkedIn sales Navigator could build targeted lists and then I ran teams of 100 plus people where their sole job was gobook meetings. The exact same process works for people that you're targeting especially targeting salespeople right. If you're in sales and your LinkedIn dings you are running to that page because there's likely money there for you right your prospects your buyers right so like your your message visibility is extremely high so I was building on a process to go attract investors there and lastly it's understanding you know how do I understand the psychology people think and operate educate them on a phone call that shows you're credible right using podcasts. Like this to go say hey want to hear my story go listen to the gold mine show right go listen to this. So you're elting things like that for credibility and articles you write and stories you share so that way someone talks in the phone. It's a warm conversation by listening to your show. I'm sure that investors you talk to people. You work with that they hear your show and they never talked to you before they get in the phone with you like oh I feel like I know you already I know how you think how you operate who you are as a person right. It's much warmer in that sense so to recap. It's who's your profile. What's your connection. How do you reach them at scale. How do you run Playbook M then how do you make it efficient to to actually run a call run a call share content with them and get in front of them.
  •  You said something at the very beginning of that that struck me you're like I'm invested in these deals myself. So you're you're not selling them something that you've never you've already put your money there. Right your your money is where your mouth is kind of I just zero in the stock market like literally like not a single dollar yeah yeah yeah uh right or wrong. It's it's just the truth. Yes you know. I don't think it's wrong. You know honestly. I think that the stock market it's um you know. It's. It's like one of these. It's like one of these stories that like kind of was a generational thing you know the stock market was was really like a baby booer thing and I think that now there's a lot of there's a lot of of people in our in our age demographic that are staying away from the stock market or diversifying in other things now whether it be funds and Commercial Real Estate or crypto or whatever um which again I have almost nothing invested in either. But it is interesting it is interesting that um that you chose to to invest. First share your success with other LPS and then through that create a fun funds so your fund helps investors create. Wealth passively can you elaborate you know for those who are listening right now or or or that not as familiar with this concept of fun to funds like can you uh elaborate on what that looks like what that means and and why you've chosen to operate it this way yeah. So when looking at raising Capital as a profession right you have three different Avenues. You can go down to raise Capital when look at compliance with the SEC so all of it stems from what can you legally go do to earn compensation. So one you can go and this is not legal advice anyway. Like one you can go the route of being a register up fera and hang your license with a broker dealer. What that means that is you can be legally paid to raise capital for commission. I didn't choose to go that route second you can go be a co-general partner in a project where you're earning piece of equity for your contribution to the group. Whether that be for raising capital or whether it be for other roles you have in that group or third. You can go the fund to funds route and what that means is that there you get better economics investing a larger checkup Capital so for example if a retail investor right like you're myself. Just investing this deal just kind of on on our own investing say 50 Grand. They may get a certain return based on the preferred return and the profit sharing split there there beyond that. But if you're investing say 500 Grand or a million dollars that you aggregate from your investors. You may get better economics so in turn you can pass along. Those same returns your investors. They get going direct if not better and make that spread between those classes of shares so by your job as a fund to fund manager you're negotiating better terms you're going own that due diligence responsibility for investors and it's a way you can be compensative for raising Capital indirectly through managing your fund. So the intention there is one to make sure you're complying with the SEC and two to really help your investors you know in terms of getting good opportunities. In front of them. They can go work with so on. My end. I knew that diversity matter me more versus being Sam the guy who does multi family deals in Texas. Right I want to be Sam. The person who brings my investors great deals in different asset classes that way can go focus on finding great Partners who do deals in a certain area right they've expertise in their asset class their area their Market. That way I can work the best of the best in every asset class because for example I probably invested in O I've been storage deals. Multif. Family deals debt um mobile home parks. Shter rentals campgrounds right because each one of those deals solves different type of thing and also depending where where where you're like a market cycle. Some things make more sense than others so it depends so my goal is to be able to provide investors different optionality to sell different pain points myself included right so there's more stuff that I was interested in I pursued and I'm like okay investors probably think the same way as well at least part of them when you're talking about retail investors LPS and there let's say that you've got a couple we obviously we have passive investors LPS that are listening to this podcast right. Now what are so you've listed. Some of the benefits of a fund of funds which is uh larger check sizes means more negotiating power more leverage right when you're sitting at the table with the GP and there's the ability to diversify amongst different asset classes Etc. What would some like what would some potential drawbacks be if any when it comes to like investing into Fun funds yeah so as a retail inv investing into a fund to fund. There's a few things you need to understand too the fee structure right because you have the actual deal level fees and you have the fund level fees as well right. The fund manager themsel gets compensated so understanding how people are getting paid and how it shakes out it's important. They're also back off as cost for aund of funds right. So you're have legal costs each deal you're doing you have back office costs in terms of k1s reporting Etc. So as long as you have the whole picture of what that looks like right fee structures and overall return packages. Like for example I run a fund called techbust. We're probably one of the largest owner operators in the strr space. Short rentals think every need properties right our fund managers who. Raise capital on our behalf and partner with us. They can actually offer better returns to their investors verus them coming to us directly. These were built specifically for fund to fund Capital so understanding what that structure is and why it makes sense is really important so the fee structure the return profiles right all of that the risk associated to it. The back office costs you know have them break down down for you right like they should able to speak to it offand very easily. If not likely look somewhere else to go invest you. You mentioned Airbnb in short-term rentals and I think this is a good time to kind of payit transition into that because I do know that you have uh some investments in the St space. A couple things you know. I think the first question that I would have is and I I'm not sure Sam.
  •  If this is like a local to the Bay Area thing but like for example I can just speak from my personal experience. Uh 5 years ago everyone was using Airbnb like everyone was like Hey like you know what Airbnb did you. No one asked like hey what are you saying. It's like what Airbnb are you saying it right like everyone was just kind of used to to going and staying in airbnbs whenever they traveled. But recently I've I've you know been talking to a lot of my my friends. My colleagues Etc. And there seems to be like this almost like Airbnb fatigue. Right like people are getting a little yeah your friends. What's the the demographic out of people going is most like sing people a couples kind of one or two off people. Typically I would say the majority of them are younger so like around my age and the the demographics kind of span right um. But the majority of them are going to be you know dinks dual income. No kids right and it's mostly the two of them going at one time right correct or sometimes they travel with groups but like the majority of them are are and by the way this is like this is not a scientific study right. This is just my general feeling. I'm I'm going some with that though right so like we don't go compete with a hotel Market. If I'm traveling with one person I'm staying in a hotel right our like when you look at the hotel markets. It's much more so bigger cities and major metros. So a few things one they're most likely to be impacted by regulations. Two economics don't make sense three. The biggest benefits of shter rentals is the common space that you have and that only plays up if you have a group so of our stays. Over 70% of our stays are six guests or more over 30% of our stays are 10 guests or more so we're catering to different audience with that in mind. So for us we focus on providing great experience manity wise but also comparable costs per head when looking at staying in in a larger place. So if you have families you need common space to cook to have social Gatherings with within that it makes a lot more sense. So if it's one person two people off going to a major city. It rarely makes sense to use Airbnb if it's a larger group. It makes sense all day long in that sense also kind of thinking of shorter rentals like you said people like what air airb did. You say at they're branding that entire Market through Airbnb and for us too. I think 92% of bookings come from there and when thinking about it if you're a good. Steward of their brand right so say you stay a house that that we ow and you're like this house was awesome. Look say this airb me was great so in turn you're more likely to go book. Another airb me in the future because your experience was was was positive so people that give quality experiences there rank extremely high in SEO and three major markets that we're in open a page of hous that sleep 10 guests or more. We're probably the first eight or nine on out of 10 on those pages for that reason. If you're a good Steward of their brand they reward you in spad and SEO rank understood so from what I and by the way all everything that you just said there makes a lot of sense right. Like so you avoid buying properties that are like less that can sleep less than six or four right which makes a lot of sense. You're staying away from larger Metras which you answered the the question that I was going to bring up which is like. All of these like you know um rules and regulations that are being that are being brought upon. The the you know the short-term rentals and the the other question that I have here for for you though when it comes to airbnbs and it just kind of piggybacking off of what you just said when you're looking at the the fatigue I think that a lot of some of it right so a lot of the feedback that I've been hearing amongst my like Inner Circle is not just like the fact that it's more con the fact that it's like more convenient when you go with like six or eight or 10 people like the convenience. Thing makes sense at scale but one of the things that I keep hearing is like oh the um the fees right like the hidden fees the just tired of like you know having to pay all of this extra money how have you like what are ways that you are like actively kind of combating that that stigma we price probably the top 20% of the market. All day long we command far higher pricing than most people actually for our properties. So the people who are staying in our properties are more concerned with experience typically than they are with overall price point right. So we typically pric in the 80 to 85th percentile depending what that looks like right so for us. It's all combination when you look at like people always ask about occupancy or adrs and it's a half stat right. Your sole focus is how do you drive as much revenue as possible. Most efficiently you people look at say occupancy for example like you're 6% occupied why right you're more concerned with the overall Revenue that you drive which so combination of what's your occupancy times your average delay rate right which is revar so really focused around that so in terms of like push back on fees you know we don't see it right like people will negotiate with you at times. But if you actually set yourself up the right way all Focus around booking lead time too. So we have data down to the day of if people checking on this date how long should they have to stay booking far out right. So you may see that something coming out on a Saturday they need to stay. At least five days make that Bing profitable for you in that sense. So you're pricing things the day based on how far out they are right. So we have a full team that manages all of our pricing and revenue management for things like that to go to go maximize overall dollars for portfolio yeah so that makes a lot of sense and by the way that that level of oversight in management is is crucial when it comes to maximizing you know any type of of transient um. It's also you know trans. It's also super important too. When you think of who's your end buyer of your portfolios in the future right we know our buyers. Our 90% chance is going to be a large institution looking to go buy hundred of doors at one time so for us we have institutional level reporting already. We can tell you down to you know the penny of every single thing that we do all categorized based on Trends data Cycles Etc. And in ution will have more confidence going into it saying this is their performance. This help go predict the future Performance. Based on what they have as well so we have everything mapped out down to a science in terms of data. We're building it as if we are you know far ahead of where we actually are stad. That's awesome man you know honestly like just hearing you talk you know. I'm I'm definitely way more involved in the hotel space than Str. Strs. There's definitely a lot of similarities in what you just said like thinking about who's the end buyer right whenever you're buying something got to think like what's the exit and and what are we doing right now to kind of prepare for that because whether it be a five a seven year hold or a 10 year hold or whatever whatever your underwriting is is geared towards you have to have that Insight in mind because otherwise you're going to be stuck with a bad asset or something that you can't offload. It's really important and so anyone that's listening to this podcast. Right now is like should be taking notes because these are questions that you should be asking your sponsors or like people that you're investing with is like hey. What's the exit strategy and what are we doing right now to prepare the asset. For that exit. Switching gears a little bit uh Sam. The market right now is very challenging for a lot of people the real estate market so what what are you seeing right now in the market and what is your what are you doing from from a tech. Vestor standpoint to kind of like hedge but then also like the fund of funds um what deals are you looking like what what are the what are these uh conditions doing in terms of opportunities that are being presented and also what what is it. What are these conditions doing in terms of like your Capital Rising efforts because I hear a lot like oh. It's hard to raise capital in this environment so yeah in order I'll go I'll go order of those so first I'm looking at Tech bester. We really focus on and the fact we can go buy so frequently right. We can get really aggressive on offering and walk into a good basis property pretty frequently right right and finding people who need to exit properties. We're getting quality basis right now in deals also looking at how do you protect yourself from Downs.
  •  In the future. All of our debt is sticks for at least 10 years. Most of our debt is sticks for 30 years or more. So for us. We operate at roughly a 3X debt service coverage ratio. Meaning we have roughly three times net operating income vers. Our debt cost every month on average. So for us. We look at fixed rate debt quality income to go cover your debt. You can hang on to your property longer than you have to and what I mean. By that is that we model five years we get paid and we sell right. It's how we get paid as sponsors. It's how we make bulk of our money but if we have to hang on to assets for six seven eight nine years to actually make sure investors. Capital is protected and preserved and performs well. We're putting things in place that allow us to go do so so right. Now. We're very concerned with how do we go protect down down protection for investors but looking at the deals we're looking at on the you know. Capital raising inside of the house outside of techbust. They're all focused on different types of things. Multif family right. Now we're we're in. We're in we're kind of very strategic looking at deals. Those deals we're participating in have to have a good story right right. Now. It's typically seller distress. They may be on a bridge loan that's coming due they may be retiring and want to get out of the business. For a long period of time right. There has to be some level of a story that the deal is distressed in some way that you're buying so part of that too is the typically that the story helps sell the deal as well because if you're raising Capital you one need a good deal two need a good partner but three the deals us have a good story to it marketability for it. For example there deals I've turned down are actually great deals because I knew my investor base wouldn't be receptive to that type of Market deal structure. Whatever it may be how good the deal is you can't actually raise for successfully. It's a being a salesperson with a great product but no one will buy it right. It's understanding what that looks like for you and last I'm going of look at the the capital raising piece of it. You know it's definitely hard to raise. Capital right now right see every dollar. You rais in 2023 was probably two and half three doll in in in like any other year in terms of level of effort. So on my end you know I actually built a community on this as well called fully funded where our sole goal is helping. Capital risers get better at raising capital and operators finding Partners to go raise capital for their projects because right now my opinion deals are better risk adjust than they have been in the last few years and when I say that is I take M family deal for example your tral class B 80s to 2000 product that's being flipped by syndicators right. Those deals been modeled to a 14 to 16 irr right give or take to investors and those same return profiles were the same two years ago and with variable rate debt higher leverage so your likelihood of actually achieving those returns you had more upside also way more downside I in basis factoring in Risk. They're actually better deals right now than they have been people. People just have less cash on hand right now and there's more fear macro wise overall overall between it's an election year the what's going on the FED. There are Wars other countries right now that we may or may not get involved in in in more capacity as well right trade issues going on so I think all those things apply to how people feel on a macro level. Everything you said is 1,00% true uh when it comes to like the fear that we're seeing in the marketplace right. Now. I'd love to know know you know when you're having those conversations. This is May more of a selfish question right so when you're having those kinds of conversations with when someone brings those things up brings them to the table like how are you you know how are you handling that how are you handling those those objections and those concerns and or are you even having those conversations right like I'm really curious so like which objections like we can roll play out. If you want like which which one if you want for example us like us Sam you know like we would really love to but you know kind of holding things a little closer to to vest right now because of all the things that are going on in the you know in all the Foreign Wars that are happening right. Now. We'll go we'll start there so on our end like our goal is help.
  •  Finance can make sense for you right for us we focus on investments that have different types of liquidity different types of upside downside protection so for you. If you're really focused on making sure you have Capital at hand. When something happens. We have an option for you that actually has liquidity within you know three months. So for us like we've prided ourselves on diversity so what we can do is if you want to have Capital you want to go park for a period of time that you may or may not need in the future but more com. But you're more concerned with how you feel comfortably about having that Capital accessible we have an option for you where you can go out earn a money market account right by at least a few points but still have access to your Capital when looking at that right think it all depends on how you structure yourself and kind of what you're doing. So you can kind of pivot each way with investors by being a capital allocator versus truly deal sponsor. You have a lot more latitude in that sense so part of is picking up on what's this person's sentiment and what they're doing right. The alternative route you can go is you know because of all these things going on in macro environment right. Now we're seeing better deals. May ever have right. This could be that 0809 look at someone's track record and these deals reflect outside's performance. People joke about it saying hey you bought those deals. 08908 0809. They shouldn't even count on your track record right. This may not be that severe but but we also may not be too far off from it too so like you look back to the you know Warren Buffett quote right. When there're spere in the marketplace. You go a lot heavier right like you buy this blood in the streets. So it's it's a you kind of waited all this time to go invest and do things and now that's the opportunity you have and you're kind of pulling back. I mean that's entirely up to you. But it's something that if it were me and I'm looking to really grow especially if you have a longer term. Horizon like now it's time to go bet bigger I love that that's awesome that's really um and it's true right like everyone. It's so so interesting you know having been on both the residential side of things and like the commercial side of things. It's like everyone's waiting for things you know for for the prices to get better for like the market to correct or adjust and then the market corrects or adjusts like right in front of them and they just like are too scared to do anything. So it's it's super fascinating right. Like human psychology. Everyone wants the the to hit the fan so to speak but then when it does everyone's like run you know even look the stock market too right like if you and this is like the things I've seen I've looked into too much if you look look at the stock market for a big period of time right. It's it's big historical averages if you weren't in the stock market in certain days where had those huge jumps you're in the red right so like being in when things are down actually gives you a good chance that them come back up but also making sure getting to deals that have the Downs protection covered right like the fixed rate debt like being in a place where you have good you know quality. Cash Flow To Go cover future expenses and buffer room there as well. Will allow you to go ride those down times out to get to a place as up stability. Yeah I love that so one of the things that I observed in just kind of like the way that you're describing your fun of funds like you are diversifying you know the portfolio is and and I don't know the answer to this. So I'm just like genuinely curious like I'm assuming that you. If someone comes to you and says hey I want to invest with you. They're not necessarily allocating to the fund for you to decide like no that gets into the whole our like you know laws about being an investment adviser. They are investing into a single project or asset based on what almost presented to them. So it's not as if they're saying gotcha you know hey I'm Sam give me Capital I'll go deploy how I see fit if they have a clear idea of what the project is the deal itself. Etc. Going into it gotcha okay. So you're basically like for lack of a better word. You're you're raising the capital soft committing but then participating in syndications on a one by one basis like you're you're syndicating capital. A Deal byal basis right so I'm not going. I have this list of10. Million committed to me that I can goate how I see fit. We're launching deals for investor based base and we have in terms of pipeline makes a lot of sense that makes a lot of sense so Switching gears a little bit Sam when you were starting out on this journey. Obviously. Like you you built single family. Portfolio. You liquidated that invested it into uh into syndications and funds like if you're a 21y old right. Now you're listening to this podcast.
  •  What uh what advice would you give to someone. That's just at the the very beginning of their their real estate investing Journey. How much money do they make in in their day job if they have one oh man that's a good question. Let's let's just say 60k like. Let's just say right now they spend to be focused on how to make that 60k 250. Then 250 500 your biggest return is making more money in your day job. At first that's fair so like investing in education and actual skills probably not you know if it were your. Bigger. Focus like should only be I didn't invest. I didn't invest at all until I start making $250,000 a year because I need every second. I could spend was better spent in my day job making more money so I'd say if you're making 60 Grand a year or 21 years old. Nothing's wrong with that but go figure out how that scales when you look at your career versus. How do I go make you know because what do you got 10 grand 100 Grand even if you have 100 Grand to go invest. You make 7% vers 12% who cares it's $5,000 right like not saying anything is wrong with that that time is better spent getting your education to a place and learning skills to go make more money. You have more to go allocate in the future. I would absolutely agree with that now to payag on top of that. Though like let's say that someone wants to get into more of like an active role. They're looking at what you're doing right now and they're saying like wow i' really love to do something like uh like what Sam does right so what advice would you have to someone that's actually looking to be a little bit more active with their um. You know with their trajectory. So that's part of why I created fully funded right. We help people understand you know we we really Target three types of people to join our community one. The active deil sponsor people actually raising Capital THM projects. They find Value by only have raised more money in place like Linked. In finding Capital Partners seconds the capital allocator like myself you know learning how to raise more capital for yourself but also how to go V Partners right. Third is the person looking to go L hand to raise capital and for them we have a huge like educational curriculum on how to actually go build your business how to go avoid a lot of the mistakes. I made at first as well that I would have paid a few extra zeros to go avoid right. So I think a big piece of it is your money is better spent in education until you're at a place in which you can really go pump meaningful cash into a portfolio of something so. I'd say whether you go to a program like mine. Whether you go do something else like figure out how to make more money consistently and or build equity into deals by leg work and hustle right like those two things will get you much further but if you're looking to go break into real estate in some capacity do two things. One of two things learn how to go find deals or learn how to go find money. Whatever you do learning skills of sales and raising money will help you no matter what 100% 100%. You know it's. It's it's interesting because like you know obviously I have a sales background as well and every I would say the vast majority of the people that I've had on this show that are either sponsors or Capital raisers have a sales background. I wouldn't say all of them but like the the majority of them do and it's super fascinating how those skills translate over so well and so I would even piggyback and say like hey if you're working that job and you want to get in. If you want to be an active uh investor and you don't have a sales position. You don't have any sales skills. I would absolutely find a way to either get a sales job. Like you said invest in some some education or something that's going to teach you how to become a better salesperson because those skills translate 1,000% and no amount of like money is going to be able to replace that knowledge. If you're. If you can sell you have insane career you know stability. You have zero job stability right like I've been in sales. I've seen people get fired like happens right. You're one quar away from a six fig check. One quar away from for being fired on performance but if you can go sell and have that Understanding Psychology a little bit understanding any people to do what you want to go do and they feel as though it's their choice right. Like that's. The most powerful thing in the entire world if you can want someone to go do something and walk them down a path that they end up feeling like that's. The best thing for them to go do on their own nothing is more powerful than having that skill by the way if you're listening right now and you're interested in any of Sam. What anything that Sam just talked about whether it be Tech Vestor or whether it be fully funded. We're going to have all those links in the description boxes below. So you can find all that information um down below Sam we're coming up on time thank you so much for your time. This has been awesome but in traditional gold M fashion. We're going to have you leave the audience with one final gold nugget o so honestly if it were me. I' just spent if you don't have any kind of sales background like spend some time learning sales right like learning sales learning a little bit of psychology stuff right. Like it'll matter what career you go do. It won't hurt you right um. Psychology money is a great book persuasion. A great book right like spend the 15 bucks in audible to have someone talking to you right like spending money on education in terms of the sales world will benefit you in every aspect of your life right. Whether it's making money whether they daating right like whatever it may be understanding how to get people to do things that you want them to go do and help them gu guy like guide. Them on. That path is so valuable so psychology and sales will pay you in every aspect of life. You spend some time learning it couldn't agree more. Sam thank you so much for your time. My friend cool man been fun.
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